Art & Life of SwarDrawS

I stayed up too late last night. I got Cindy on the phone at 9:45 pm to wish her a late happy birthday and didn't hang up with her until midnight. This morning I am paying for it. Not so much because I am tired but for some reason I am feeling anxiety. Everything is slightly putting me in a panic.

Last night after Sherry left, we attacked our pumpkins. We got lots of seeds and both RAW and Hollace were excited over roasted pumpkin seeds. I felt a little pressure to make sure they were good. Well they are soppy. I put too much oil/butter and worstester sauce.

Because I was on the phone too late I forgot to put the seeds away so this morning I lay in bed for some reason fretting about them, then I just started worrying about everything else (trick-or-treating, getting Hollace's bangs cut, big deal stuff like that). I know it was because I was over tired. I drove to work trying to find music to ease my mind but couldn't so I just turned the radio off and fretted. I just want to crawl back in bed but I worry about taking a sick day where I am not really sick and what kind of message I am giving to young impressionable Hollace. Oh dang, I just remembered last night I was going to put Hollace's movie on tape for her teacher but I didn't. Now I am worrying about that. Maybe I will go home to work.

I suppose my mind won't ease until I hear RAW and Hollace tell me the pumpkin seeds are great!

Posted by swardraws at 08:13 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Sherry had Saturday off and decided she was coming up to visit this weekend as long as she could find someone to cart AJ around to all the parties she goes to.

On Saturday she finally shows up at 3 or so after dropping off a friend somewhere in the suburbs and getting lost. We go out and get some margarita fixins and RAW grills up some steak. We have a good time just hanging out.

Sunday morning since it was time change, we used our gained hour to go to church. AJ is pissed that her mom wasn't leaving in the morning and called my cell phone twice in church. Sherry's friend that she dropped off was also expecting Sherry to come back and pick her up Sunday morning. Of course Sherry had other ideas and hung out with us until 5:00. After church we went to Quigs apple orchard for some quaint store shopping, hayride and lunch and then to Target where I needed to go get another cool floor lamp for my office since RAW took mine for the living room.

After Sherry left and we had a nice family time working on the pumpkins (see other post), RAW had Hollace sweep up some dropped popcorn in the kitchen. I guess she didn't sweep the whole house or something and he flipped out on her. I came in and broke united parents rule #1, don't contridict each other and went to Hollace's aid who was crying on the couch. RAW was projecting his anger over how worthless Sherry's kids are (they are lazy) and was being tough on Hollace so she doesn't turn out that like. The thing is his yelling is exactly like Sherry's yelling at her kids was and you can see how her kids respect that. I can't seem to get through to him that getting mad and yelling at Hollace isn't the approach to getting her do what you want. Dinner time is often fun because of this.

We have another big blow up while trying to get Hollace ready for her bath that wasn't too pretty. In the end RAW appologized to Hollace, I appologized to RAW and I guess all is well. Well not really but good enough for tonight.

Posted by swardraws at 11:12 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Last night we had Haley over for dinner. She has been wanting to eat over at our house for a long time. I get home from work and Haley is playing as usual with Hollace. Hollace has been wanting grilled cheese so I thought that would be good. I burned the first set and had to start over. I also warmed some chicken noodle soup and some peas. Hollace had a royal meltdown over the soup. She doesn't eat soup and you would of thought I was feeding her poison. That in turn flipped RAW's switch and he melted down as well. Haley apparently has a thing for peas and ate every one in site including the few left on Hollace's plate. Haley was telling me that she was going out with her aunt for a Halloween costume. This venture was delayed because her aunt was in ICU after taking too many Tylenol and harming her liver. Yikes.

A week or two ago, Hollace and Haley "wrote" a play called the Blooded River (or Blund Rivfr Muvie according to their title screen). They were anxious to perform it for me at the park so I grabbed the camcorder and taped it. There were 5 scenes which ended with both of them falling to the ground dead and then declaring, "act 2 (and so on) over!". I worked the movie in iMovie, went in Garageband for some creepy music then outputted to DVD in iDVD. It was cute. I gave Haley's mom a DVD when we walked Haley home after dinner last night.

I don't know if it was RAW's outrage at dinner or his grumbling over how to work the TV now after Tivo was installed but I went into grumpy mode the rest of the night. I wanted to go to Menards last night to pick up the new entertainment center but RAW got on the phone and gabbed. I wish I got the Tivo installed on the computer room TV instead where I can enjoy it and not hear RAW complain. I will have to see if I can move it.

Posted by swardraws at 07:56 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Well I am still on my kick about doing something about this house. Last weekend I was out of boxes and desparate to box something up LOL. Tom at work finally made his move to J28 and brought with him 12 boxes. My eyes glazed over. I took 5. I think that should finish me up.

This week found me taking the train into Chicago for Action Script training. Why oh why can I not find decent training on the finer points of AS? I was disappointed in this class. I had to help the instructor out a couple times and we got out way early every day.

Running around Chicago was nice though. The 1.5 train ride allowed me to catch up on my sleep or reading and lunch was good. I took tons of photos of tall shiny buildings.

Today the DirectTv guy came to install our Tivo. I wished I could of been home for this. Raleigh took that time to also de-install the TV wall unit that I have been clearing. Poor Cloudy, she finally figured out how to climb it and then we take it down. Now it is time to repair the wall underneath it and paint.

I thought the pink carpet the previous owners had was ugly you should see what was still under the TV wall. Orange and brown mottled stuff, yuck!

Last night Cloudy got out. it took us 30 minutes in the dark to find her and get her back in. Thank goodness for her jingling collar so we could pin point her by sound.

Right now I am editing the play Hollace and Haley performed for me that I filmed. It is funny called the Blooded River or as their title screen says...the Blund Rivf Muvie. Got to love 6 year olds.

Haley's mom told me yesterday that they are for sure moving Nov 17.. Even though Haley taught Hollace the word Mother F&cker (Hollace was more concerned over Haley's use of the word Stupid), we will miss her.

I want a new iPod.

I am working on my wish list for December when my profitsharing check comes in. I have been getting the computer room ready for a treadmill, my printer is on the brink and I really want a wide angle lens for the camera. I will have to move the numbers around once I know them to see if a new iPod is also in my future.

Posted by swardraws at 12:51 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

On Friday morning right before the alarm clock went off I heard RAW curse the house. He hates this house and whenever anything happens he blames the house. Well he was cursing the house so at that moment I decided I will do something to get the house ready for sale. First thing first is to get rid of that built in complete wall entertainment center that came with the house. We need to do that before we recarpet which we are in dire need of. I snagged a bunch of boxes from work and cleared all the books and crap from the wall unit. In the computer room I decided to put my long work table in to storage to make room for the treadmill I want so I am clearing clutter from that room too.

RAW doesn't know what is going on. I found out later that he wasn't curing the house but the small lamp that just fell on him. Whatever, the balls are rolling now.

All weekend I boxed up stuff and on Monday I took the day off for Columbus Day. Me and Hollace went to Ikea where I bought a smaller coffee table. I will put my old one in storage. I really hate to spend the money on storage and apparently so does RAW as he keeps offering me to put it all in the garage. The thing is the garage is one of the problems with the clutter that I never hear the end of with him.

Another thing I am getting ready for is high gas bills this winter so while at Ikea I bought us all down filled comforters.

While I am making all these changes around the house, Paula is about to make a really big change. She is moving back to the area! I am thrilled, it will be so cool to have her close to here and I am glad I got a chance to see her while she was in Baltimore.

Anyway, it is time to get ready for bed.

Posted by swardraws at 10:58 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Today I was a wedding photographer for the mafia LOL. Yesterday Raleigh was at Art works with Hollace and the lady next door who runs a cake shop ran in and was asking if anyone knew a photographer. She knew someone who was getting married tomorrow and their photographer fell through. A family member was suppose to take the shots but had to go out of town unexpectedly. They just needed someone to take a few pictures at their home, then the church and then to this restaurant reception. it paid about $100 for 3 hours of work. I am not a wedding photographer or ever desire to be one but I reluctantly said ok when it sounded like a fairly low key, low pressure event.

I then talk to the mother of the bride and she said her daughter already got married by a justice of the peace and already had a kid and is now expecting a second. They finally got it passed by the archdiocese to have a small 30 minute church wedding.

I get to their house which really is a big fancy house and no one was ready except the bride and she is wearing the fanciest dress I have ever seen. It was her mother's and it cost her back in the day, $5000.

I notice their Lincoln out front has Zaza as their license plate which is the name of the restraunt the reception was. They were very italian and owned this gangster themed place. I felt so awkward hanging around the church and then this restaurant photographing these strangers. My personality does not lend itself well to wedding photography but I hope I give them what they are looking for. Dang, I shot nearly 200 pictures. I ended up hanging around them for 5 hours and she kicked in an extra $25 but sheesh remind me never to agree to do anything like this again.

Posted by swardraws at 11:39 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)